Stranger Danger

[Zephyr]

I thought about it a couple months ago, and growing up we're told to never talk to any strangers, not to trust anybody. Then this topic has come up a couple times in the last month. Once I was discussing it with my friend Sarah. Then today, I was waiting at the DMV to renew the tags on my car, and some people were discussing it as well.

What really struck me was when one lady said, "We need to teach our children to stay away from all people that they don't know, there are a lot of creepy people out there these days."

While I didn't say anything, my thoughts on the subject are different. In my opinion, yes, teaching about stranger danger is a must. But rather than telling children that all people that they don't know are bad people, we should teach them the warning signs of dangerous strangers. We're taught that everybody is out to get us, and this is a big fat lie. I remember every year, from K-6, counselors would come around and make us watch videos of children being taken away and how you can't ever trust anybody. I think that the majority of people are of good merit, it's just the minority of 'creepers' that make people look bad.

What are your thoughts on the subject?

[AllThatIsLeft]

I totally agree with you.
It really bothers me when they say everyone is out there to get you....
and there should definitely be some education on how to recognize a creepy person. Not just a assume everyone is.

[Loislane]

To me, the word 'strangers' is awful. Yes, even though when you are speaking to someone is technically speaking to a 'stranger', but I didn't know anyone when I started school in year 7, so really, I was talking to strangers.
My teachers were strangers to me when I started this school. Some still as, as there are many teachers in my school, meaning they don't all teach me. Doesn't mean I'll just sit there without putting my hand up for anything.

I never really talk to men. I know that sounds very sexist, but so be it. If I was to talk to strangers, the majority of the time it would be a woman.
The other day I was on the bus and wasn't 100% sure where I was going, I had to ask a young lady to help me about giving some information on where-abouts my stop was. Yes, I was talking to a stranger, but I'd rather have asked her where I was going then be walking through some dangerous street.

I can tell the difference between general looking people and men/woman that just look sleezy. I will warn my children at a decent age not to talk to strangers, of course, but I think teachers/parents jump to that conclusion alot as we are there students/children. All parents worry about their children.

So really, I do agree with you, and I think it was a great conversation to bring up :)

[theOperaGhost]

There's a fine line with this. I don't think we should teach our children to fear people, which is basically what is being done. I do feel they should be very weary of strangers who approach them and talk to them though. Most people are not going to approach a strange child and talk to them, unless they have malicious intentions. I agree with Steph that more emphasis should be on teaching children the warning signs of perps, not teaching them to be afraid of all strangers.

[Demonic Angel]

I so agree. As a little kid I was so afraid to talk to anyone because of being told so much about strangers being bad. I always got nervous when my mom started talking to a random person, like if we were waiting in line for something.

[Antares]

Well our schools never instilled that type of...fear in us. With showing us like pictures and videos (and i have been to 4 different school districts), but I was told not to talk to strangers.
It wasn't beat in my head relentlessly, but then again I lived in somewhat of a...rural almost area for most of my lower grades.
However, I think that kids should be taught not to trust strangers with their lives and to make sure you try at all possible means to stay with the people you know.

I also agree however that they should be taught the warning signs. If they say they have candy for you, run and scream. If they touch you weird, run and scream.

Idk, I think that it also depends on the kid too. Obviously some kids have more common sense than others, etc.

So yea, thats my take

[Camazotz]

As a kid, I'd get paranoid that I would be kidnapped if I was more than 10 feet away from my mother at the local grocery store. I always heard, "Never trust strangers." I was always scare because of this fear that adults had told us was true.

While on vacation, my brother and I got separated from our parents. We were about 6 or 7 at the time; needless to say, we were both really scared. When a group of elderly women saw that we were alone, they asked if we needed help. We told them yes, they told a bellhop and the bellhop took us to our room where our parents were waiting.

From this day on, I've learned that not all people are bad. You can trust people; you just have to take precautions when talking to a stranger.

[Atonement]

I don't think instilling fear into the hearts of children will be good for them. Not all strangers are bad. Hell, if someone's a stranger, you can't make friends if you don't get to know them.

I think instead of saying stay away from strangers, we should encourage caution when in a situation with a stranger and not to be hasty to do anything.

[ShatteredWings]

My old elementary school didn't touch on stranger danger.
Luckly, i was a cautious kid when it came to people, so I didn't talk to the older creeper who offererd candy, or went into a room alone with ANY one (you can imagine bathroom breaks in kindergarten....)

But beating it into kids heads that every stranger iis just causing unnessary paranoia. You tell them this, yet you also tell them that "if you get lost, talk to a person in a police uniform or a mommy"? How does that make any sence. Not all strangesr are bad, actually, most would haev the best of intentions. It makes more sense to teach kids what not to do with strangers
like, say ,gettting into their car, letting them touch them in any form, going anywhere that you don't want to go, stuff like that

[Bougainvillea]

It sucks.
What if you were trying to help them and they're like "Get the fuck away CREEPER!"

[INFERNO]

I don't care for the idea of telling kids to stay away from strangers. If parents want that, then toss the kid in a closet and shut the door. But since that doesn't occur too often, kids shouldn't fear socializing with other people as humans are social animals, humans require social interaction. Also, at some point or another, the kid is going to have to associate with some people they don't know. One example that comes to mind is school; should all the kids cringe in fear of associating with a kid or adult they don't know? Of course not.

As for teaching the kids who to trust and who to not trust, it is a good idea in theory but the problem is, the people who are "creepy" or who should be avoided are not easy to spot until you come to know them. Obviously there are times when it is fairly easy to spot a possible predator but I think that educating kids on who is a "bad person" won't be an easy task if we are to want it to occur successfully. People who are "bad people" tend to know how to blend in and even when you talk to some of them, you still cannot figure it out. For example, Dr. Robert Hare is a psychologist who studies (and has a book or two) on psychopathy. In the book entitled Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us, he mentions times when a psychopath manipulated the crap out of him and numerous other psychologists. We can't really expect kids to be taught how to spot a "bad person" because not only would it take a lot of time and effort, even the experts can't spot a "bad person" looking at them right in the face.

If anything, I'd say to teach kids about some of the obvious and common "bad people". I'd also say to teach them about ways to remove themselves from the situation if they suspect it's a "bad person" or if they find something uncomfortable with the person. But the issue I have with this idea is that the obvious bad people are obvious and the kids probably don't need a lot of education to figure this out.

However, the concern is for the bad people who are not obvious. How do we get to teach this to the kids when so many of these bad people fool the parents and possible experts? We could in theory teach about individual cases but it'd be pain-staking effort.

[Eagle1]

I thought about it a couple months ago, and growing up we're told to never talk to any strangers, not to trust anybody. Then this topic has come up a couple times in the last month. Once I was discussing it with my friend Sarah. Then today, I was waiting at the DMV to renew the tags on my car, and some people were discussing it as well.

What really struck me was when one lady said, "We need to teach our children to stay away from all people that they don't know, there are a lot of creepy people out there these days."

While I didn't say anything, my thoughts on the subject are different. In my opinion, yes, teaching about stranger danger is a must. But rather than telling children that all people that they don't know are bad people, we should teach them the warning signs of dangerous strangers. We're taught that everybody is out to get us, and this is a big fat lie. I remember every year, from K-6, counselors would come around and make us watch videos of children being taken away and how you can't ever trust anybody. I think that the majority of people are of good merit, it's just the minority of 'creepers' that make people look bad.

What are your thoughts on the subject?

agreed The world is way too careful

[sebbie]

Personally I think it is better than children are taught that all strangers are a risk to them, the reason for this is children are more vunerable to being exploited than an adult.

As they grow older they will learn from their own life experience on how to judge people and interact.

[Sage]

Children aren't going to develope a good sense of how to judge one's character if they assume every person they don't know is the scum of the earth.

[BuryYourFlame]

I sort of agree with what you are saying Steph...but can we really expect children to pick up on facial expressions and body language that would identify someone such as a person, when they are only just beginning to learn the basics such as happy/sad/angry?

Although it may cause social awkwardness, is it worth the increased amount of social awkwardness of a child who has been molested?

Just ideas I'm putting out there...

[Donkey]

Children should be taught about pedophiles and kidnappers but not that everyone is one.

[MysticalBurrito]

I think it should be enforced a little bit not like "Everyone is EVIL"
Like Jon said they should be taught about pedophiles ect.
I grew up thinking everyone wanted to hurt me because when I was younger I was molested by someone my parents and I trusted.

[Modus Operandi]

Children definetly need to be taught about "good" strangers and "bad" strangers. Not just that all strangers are scum and pedophiles. The biggest problem with teaching kids the normal way is that they have no discriminatory mechanisms. Meaning that they don't have any clue down the road as to how to know good people from bad people.

Note: 'discriminatory' is not being used as a term to signify racial, gender, or anything like that.

[INFERNO]

Personally I think it is better than children are taught that all strangers are a risk to them, the reason for this is children are more vunerable to being exploited than an adult.

As they grow older they will learn from their own life experience on how to judge people and interact.

The problem here is that they are given the mentality of everyone is a danger to them. So when they go somewhere, such as to a school, if all kids were taught this and adhered to it, then every kid would be paranoid of one another, teachers, staff and other parents. They wouldn't engage in any interaction because they're doing what they're told: don't interact with strangers.

As they grow older, they may figure out that not all strangers are dangerous and should be avoided but this isn't something that's going to come to them right away. If they're taught this, then they're going to take a good amount of time to figure out that only certain people shouldn't be trusted.

As for being more vulnerable, that's not entirely true. Many old people are also quite vulnerable to being taken advantage of. Hell, so are many of the working class people.